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As the Cardinals try and straighten out the offensive line, left guard Daryn Colledge got a couple of reps at left tackle today in practice behind new starter D’Anthony Batiste. Colledge played there at Boise State for five years and for “six or seven” games when he played in Green Bay, but make no mistake — this would be an emergency situation and not a possible plan to play there from the outset.

“Hopefully some athleticism and some practice can take over if that situation arises, but hopefully that situation never happens,” Colledge said. “I’m working to be the best left guard as I can for this team and I feel that’s where they need me. If they need me (at left tackle) because someone goes down, we’ll cross that bridge then.

“It’s not necessarily riding a bike, but with a few practices, I could probably get myself out there and feel comfortable. I’m not here to threaten a job. I’m here to solidify myself at left guard and if there is an injury and they need me.”

Both of the Cards’ starting guards have tackle experience. Right guard Adam Snyder has played right tackle with the 49ers. But with both players, coach Ken Whisenhunt has made clear he wants them to play guard. And Whisenhunt (and Russ Grimm, for that matter) have long been believers in trying to fill a hole on the offensive line with a new piece if at all possible, rather than moving someone already on the line to a new position and then creating two (or more) “new” players on the line for the unit to get used to.

Besides, when the roster is trimmed to 53, and on game days when the Cards may have as few as seven offensive linemen active, the more everyone who is on the active roster can do increases significantly.

Darren,
Cards are handling the OL correctly- keep the guards intact and try to upgrade the tackles. Good QB play is needed to make any OL perform at a satisfactory level and the QBs are still making silly mistakes.
Make no mistake about it, the Defense is the achilles heel of this team. The defense has also been very healthy and still gives up yardage at an alarming rate. Horton is a novice and the scheme is wrong.

Exactly.not a real solution but there are too many players who we need who are in that category of burned bridge. Yet,If I’m in the front office and I walk by practice and see darren college practicing at tackle I’m gonna look in free agent for tackles and head coaches.we haven’t gotten to week 1.its not acceptable.

they really need a veteran, i know they dont grow on trees.. if another tackle goes down it will be ugly.. I see wayne hunter was traded for jason smith.. we have a surplus of skilled position players, gotta be someone out there, darren any ideas?

Hey Darren,
Is there a chance for Rich Ohrenberger and Russ Hochstein to make it on the team? Since our O-Line isn’t as great as we expected, the veteran presence might help.
And is it possible for Jeremy Bridges to lose his backup job to 1 of the 2 I mentioned?

LT- 1 D’Anthony Batiste 2 Nate Potter
LG- 1 Daryn Colledge 2 Rich Ohrnberger
C- 1 Lyle Sendlein
RG- 1 Adam Snyder
RT- 1 Bobby Massie
Any Questions? Perfect for right now because no matter what I think if D’Anthony is not performing then you cut him, assign Daryn to left tackle, Rich Ohrnberger gets the start at left guard, and Nate Potter goes to backup for Daryn. Then we will sign Jeff Otah.

Anyone who knows anything about media communications knows this whole thing is a white wash. They messed up starting w/bringing Payton Manning in for dinner, plus have probably ruined the careers of Kolb and Skelton. The head coach and GM are at fault, because they can’t field a consistent team–patchwork doesn’t work. They won’t be successful again until they change hired hands. And Grimm will never be able to get anything close to what he had for an O-line. at the Steelers, or the Redskins. If Todd Haley still has a house here he may well be getting a call to become head coach for the Cards come next season if his Steelers contract is not all that binding.

its a mess. We are trying to delude ourselves into thinking that a 2nd string OL at best when fully healthy will be okay against 1st string DEF in regular season with 3rd string players. I know these guys are professionals, but its still 3rd string capability against 1st string when the clock starts next week. QB play is a big problem, compounded by an OL that is not good. As someone else said, hope the QB’s can run, because they’ll need to. Other sad thing is all the expectation on having a good running game this season is probably a bust too based on the miserable Oline. So much for that fun. I don’t think its going to be fun to watch the season unfold either, its going to be painful. Unless something miraculous happens, we are in for a long long poor offensive showing in AZ. I like the cards, but its getting old, its same old stuff with them. Good luck, truly.

“Other sad thing is all the expectation on having a good running game this season is probably a bust too based on the miserable Oline.”

I agree. I’ve been thinking that for some time, but haven’t posted it.

With an ineffective OL and only average QBs (at best), the running game AND passing game will struggle and there will be a lot of 3 & outs.

The D will have to be in peak physical condition for the time that they will spend on the field.

Now, on to the decision to play only Lindley and Bartel against the Broncos. I think that it’s a good idea. Even though Kolb and Skelton aren’t the second coming of Montana and Unitas, they’re the best that the Cards have and the team can’t afford to have them injured in a meaningless pre-season game.

WHIZ, NAME THE QB STARTER!!! You won’t learn any more by watching them in practice.

A bunch of somebody’s. Doesn’t anyone pay attention to anything anymore? Colledge proved in GB that he isn’t a LT in this league. Otah failed two physicals, Lutui one. Barron has failed to stay with four different teams throughout his career. So if I’m understanding the posts regarding our OL correctly, we should be fielding a line that consists of either Jeff Otah or Alex Barron at LT, with Lutui at one of the Guard positions. But Grimm is the one who doesn’t know what he’s doing and we’re better off without Levi.

Of course, it all sounds relatively intelligent compared to hearing that our defense is our achilles heel.

Watching all the preseason games closely I feel that Rich Ohrnberger has played very well at Center and OG. He versatility would be a huge asset to the team. I guess all these questions about the O line will be answered in three days.

Has anyone heard of the possibility being floated about having Kelemete play some left tackle to see how he does in the pro game? I understand he was a beast at left tackle for two years at Washington and second team All Pac12. He must have some skills to have started 26 games for two straight seasons.. I know the Cards think he is better suited for guard, but with the Cards poor track record of skills assessments and development of young talent (Brown and Young are prime examples), it seems it would be worth giving this kid a shot to see if he has fast enough feet, strength, and college skills to make the transition to tackle in the NFL.

Lol, ha ha, you made me laugh, don’t really disagree. But it just doesn’t seem as desperate as all who would have it so. I remember a pretty sad OL configuration that went to the SB.

I would offer that on the two up tempo drives, Kolb 4 for 4 and 8 for 9., the OL looked dang good. They have also looked good in run blocking. We’ll see if Whiz plays to his OL configuration’s strengths.

Kolb will start based on the last gameplay in tenn.I mean its pretty bad when thats your guy but I hope he can wrangle it in and finish some games, I just believe the first jacked up d-fence we face will injure the guy, there is good reason to believe he will not make it as far into the season as last year, then its Skeltons turn, going on 3rd yr since Warner and still no qb, say goodbye to your attendance record Mr. Bidwell unfortunately we do that together also.

Two nice WCO style drives by Kolb does not erase all of his other bad performances. In fact what is particularly troubling is his interception rate which is double of what he did last year and terrible for a 6th year pro. Skelton’s knock was his interceptions, inaccuracies, and reads. Whiz says Skelton has vastly improved on his accuracy and reads while his interceptions have also dropped.
If the Cards play Kolb, it is clear that Whiz must revamp his offense to use only the plays that are WCO type plays. Kolb has shown he can execute those plays, but is terrible with the rest of the playbook. Skelton, on the other hand, gives the Cards their best chances for more wins than with Kolb.

As for your point regarding the SB, the reason the poor offensive line was not continually exposed as being bad was Kurt Warner with his lightning reads and Arena Football release.

Too bad the Cards did not send Kolb and Skelton to learn the Arena Football skills (quick defense reads and quick timing passing) that would immensely help them play well in the NFL.

we may find out just how good a coach Grimm is.. he’s doing overtime with Massie, maybe Kelemete and Potter can step up… who knows… but i never underestimate this staff… right when you think we’ll head south somehow they engineer a turn around.. Ohrnberger just might be a solid player, does that make Snyder an OT candidate? maybe… chicken scratch sometimes is decent chicken soup… with proper seasoning;0